My article about the deployment of Cozad; U.S. teams advance to semifinals at Junior Davis and BJK Cups; Blanch reaches Challenger semi-final; Teenagers Urhobo, Hance and Johnston move to Orlando; Tien reaches second ATP final; Zheng will defend the NCAA title after qualifying today

Ryan Cozad, who turned 17 a few weeks ago, is ranked No. 1 in Tennis Recruiting Network’s Class of 2027 and after visits to TCU, Georgia, Texas and Virginia, he made the decision to commit to the Cavaliers late last month. I spoke with Ryan and his father Matt about the whirlwind of the past four months, which started when Ryan spoke to college coaches in June, narrowed his search to the schools he wanted to visit and found the best fit with Andres Pedroso and the Cavaliers, for today’s article on the Tennis Recruiting Network.

After a day off Thursday, the ITF Junior Davis Cup and Junior Billie Jean King Cup resumes today in Santiago Chile with quarter-final matches. Both top-seeded teams from the United States, both defending champions, posted another 3-0 win, with the girls defeating unseeded Japan and the boys defeating unseeded Spain.

Captain Georgi Rumenov made no changes to his No. 1 and No. 2 singles lineups, with ITF World Junior No. 1 Kristina Penickova at No. 2 singles and Julieta Pareja, WTA No. 347, at No. 1. Neither has lost a set, and that continued today, with Penickova beating Miyu Nishiwaki 6-1, 6-2 and Pareja beating Yui Komada 6-2, 6-4. Being the knockout stage, the doubles matches are often not played after the clinch, but Kristinia and Annika Penikcova played a short sets match with Aoi Watanabe and Nishiwaki and won it 4-2, 4-0.

The girls will face No. 4 seed Czech Republic in the semi-finals on Saturday after the Czech Republic beat No. 7 Great Britain 2-0. The other girls’ semifinal will feature No. 6 seed Poland, which defeated No. 2 seed Romania 2-1, and No. 3 seed France, which defeated No. 8 seed Taiwan 3-0.

The American boys have lost two sets in singles, including one in today’s win over Spain. Jordan Lee dropped the opening set 7-5 to Adolfo Abascal, but recovered to take the second and third sets 6-3, 6-2. Andrew Johnson, playing No. 1 singles for the first time this week, defeated Alberto Pulido Moreno 6-0, 6-4 to clinch the tie. Johnson and Michael Antonius won the doubles match 6-2, 6-3.

The boys will play No. 8 seed Turkey, which defeated No. 7 seed Korea 2-1. The surprise of the day was Germany’s unseeded 2-1 victory over No. 2 seed France, with Eric Dylan Mueller beating France’s No. 1 Daniel Jade 5-2, 5-7, 6-3 to level the match, then teaming with Jannik Soetebier for a 6-4, 6-1 win in the deciding doubles match over Jade and Amaury Abbas. Germany faces No. 4 seed Japan, which defeated No. 3 seed Czech Republic 2-1.

Links to streaming (subscription) and live score can be found on the ITF Junior Circuit site. Selected replays are available without a subscription from the MEGA YouTube channel. Today’s American boys match against Spain is here.

Kalamazoo 18s champion Darwin Blanch continued his run at the Knoxville Challenger 50reached his first Challenger semi-final this afternoon with a 6-3, 7-6(5) win over No. 2 seed Jay Clarke of Great Britain. Blanch will play No. 6 seed Daniil Glinka of Estonia, who defeated qualifier Shunsuke Mitsui (Tennessee) 7-5, 6-3. In the top half, No. 5 seed Mitchell Krueger defeated Inaki Montes (Virginia) of Spain 7-5, 6-4 and will face unseeded Cedrik-Marcel Stebe of Germany, who defeated qualifier Murphy Cassone (Arizona State) 7-6 (13), 6-3.

Seventeen-year-olds Keaton Hance and Noah Johnston reached their first USTA Pro Circuit semifinals today, with Hance following up his victory over top seed Tristan McCormick on Thursday with a 6-4, 6-1 win over Christopher Li (UNC, Tennessee, Ohio State) in today’s quarterfinals at the Orlando M15. He will play qualifier Ryan Colby (USC, Georgia), who reached his first Pro Circuit semifinal with a 6-4, 6-4 victory over No. 3 seed Felix Corwin (Minnesota).

Johnston recorded his third victory in the past four months today over fellow left-handed junior Nikolas Stoot, with a 7-6(5), 6-1 decision. Johnston will face unseeded Aleksa Ciric (Georgia Gwinnett) of Serbia, who defeated No. 5 seed Ryan Fishback (Virginia Tech) 6-2, 4-6, 6-3.

Eighteen-year-old Max Exsted will play for the third Pro Circuit doubles title of his career Saturday in Orlando when he and top seeds William Nolan (Auburn) take on the unseeded team of Colby and Noah Zamora (UC-Irvine).

In the women’s quarterfinals W35 in Orlandothe veterans beat the juniors, with the exception of 18-year-old Akasha Urhobo. Urhobo, the No. 8 seed, defeated University of Georgia sophomore Anastasiia Gureva 6-4, 6-1 and will face No. 2 seed Eva Bedder of the Netherlands, who defeated No. 6 seed Madison Sieg (USC) 6-1, 6-3. Top seed Viktoria Hruncakova of Slovakia defeated 15-year-old qualifier Welles Newmman 6-0, 6-2 and will face No. 3 seed Katarina Jokic (Georgia) in the semifinals. Jokic defeated 16-year-old wildcard Thea Frodin 6-1, 2-6, 7-5.

Although they lost in the singles, Frodin and Newman advanced to the doubles final. They defeated Sophia Biolay (Central Florida) of France and Katerina Mandelikova (Florida International) of the Czech Republic 7-6 (6), 6-4 and will face another unseeded team in Samantha Alicea (Arizona State, Nebraska) and Malkia Ngounoue (Kansas) on Saturday.

At the M25 in East LansingMichigan State senior Ozan Baris and Yale senior Vignesh Gogineni continued their confidence-building runs ahead of the NCAA Championships by advancing to the semifinals. Gogineni defeated Gavin Young (Michigan) 7-5, 6-3 to reach his second semifinal in just his fourth Pro Circuit tournament played this year. The 22-year-old from Ohio will play LSU freshman Erik Arutiunian of Belarus, who defeated No. 7 seed Maik Steiner (Western Michigan) of Germany 6-1, 6-4.

Baris, who had saved seven match points in his first-round victory over No. 2 seed Paul Jubb (South Carolina) of Great Britain, saved one more today in his second-set tiebreak with No. 5 seed Adhithya Ganesan (Florida). Trailing 5-2 in the third set, Baris won the last five games of the match for a 3-6, 7-6(6), 7-5 victory.

His semifinal opponent, No. 4 seed Aidan McHugh of Great Britain, avoided an all-Spartan semifinal with a 6-2, 6-2 victory over Michigan State sophomore Matt Forbes. McHugh and Baris played in the M25 quarterfinals in East Lansing last summer, with McHugh winning 6-2, 2-6, 6-4.

At the W15 in Lincoln Nebraska18-year-old Anna Frey advanced to her second W15 semifinal, beating No. 4 seed Kristina Novak (Oklahoma State) of Slovenia 6-4, 6-1. The North Carolina recruit will face top seed and Oklahoma freshman Edda Mamedova of Russia, who defeated Pepperdine freshman Sonja Zhiyenbayeva of Kazakhstan 6-2, 6-3. Duke sophomore Irina Balus of Slovakia, the No. 2 seed, will play unseeded Lucia Peyre (Oklahoma State) of Argentina in the other semifinal. Balus defeated Duke recruit and No. 5 seed Aspen Schuman 6-2, 6-3 today.

At the WTA 125 in Austin, TexasBoth Mary Stoiana and Elli Mandlik lost today, so I think this means Mandlik wins the USTA wildcard at the Australian Open, although it will be Monday before the USTA is likely to confirm this. Top seed Iva Jovic defeated Stoiana 6-0, 6-1 and No. 3 seed Renata Zarazua of Mexico defeated Mandlik 6-1, 6-3. Jovic will play unseeded Marina Stakusic from Canada in the semi-finals; Zarazua’s opponent is University of Texas sophomore Carmen Herea of ​​Romania, who won the battle of the Longhorn wild cards with a 6-1, 6-3 victory over Malaika Rapolu.

Pupil Ten (USC) has reached his second ATP final, both this fall, with the 19-year-old beating lucky loser Vitaliy Sachko of Ukraine 6-1, 6-4 at the ATP 250 in Metz Today. Tien didn’t have the toughest of draws this week, beating a wildcard and two lucky losers, but he did beat former ATP Top 10 player Matteo Berrettini of Italy 5-7, 6-2, 6-3 in the quarter-finals on Thursday. In Saturday’s final, Tien will play against number 7 seed Cam Norrie (TCU) of Great Britain for the fourth time this year; Tien has won the last two meetings.

Another eight players have booked their spots at the DI NCAA singles championships in Orlando, starting in 11 days, after winning quarterfinals at the ITA Conference Masters Today.

The women’s semi-finalists are the Georgian Aysegui Mert[1]Ni Xi of UNC-Charlotte[7]Eugenia Zozaya Mendendez of USC[8] and Cal’s Mao Mushika[2]. Reigning NCAA champion Michael Zheng returns to defend his title after surviving two set points in the opening set to beat No. 7 seed Veljko Krstic of Elong 7-6(5), 6-1.

Martin Borisiouk of NC State[4]Jeremy Jin from Florida[6] and Edward Winter of Pepperdine[2] are the other men’s semifinalists heading to Orlando.